A Houston address does not mean Houston ISD. Twenty-five school districts in Houston, TX serve homes inside the city limits, Houston ISD covers about 45% of the city’s land area, and the location of the lot, not the mailing city and not the ZIP code, decides which one a house belongs to. A Houston address a relocating family types into a search box can sit in Katy ISD, Cypress-Fairbanks ISD, Spring Branch ISD, Clear Creek ISD or one of twenty others. Below is how the 25 districts break down across the city, why the address decides, and how to confirm the district and the campus before you write an offer. For the city itself, its areas and what it costs to live there, start with my Houston, Texas city guide, and if you are moving from out of state my guide to relocating to Houston covers the rest of the move; this post stays on the school-district question.
Ratings and boundaries as of October 2026: district count and shares of the city’s land area from the U.S. Census Bureau’s TIGERweb school-district layer, measured October 19, 2026; district ratings are the Texas Education Agency’s 2026 accountability ratings (released August 14, 2026; TXschools.gov data last updated October 5, 2026). Shares are of the city’s land area. I refresh this post each August when TEA releases new ratings.
School districts in Houston, TX: the one-minute version
Every district below touches the City of Houston. The table groups them by the part of the city where they mainly show up, so you can find your area first and your district second. The TEA ID is what you type into TXschools.gov to pull the district’s own report card; paste the ID into the TXschools.gov search box, since the site works by search rather than by link. The rating describes the district as a whole, not every campus in it, and the share tells you how much of the city’s land sits inside each district, which is not the same as how many homes. Each district publishes its own attendance-boundary lookup on its website; search the district’s name plus attendance boundaries, or use the links in the last column where I keep campus pages.
| District | TEA ID | TEA 2026 rating | Share of city land area | Confirm the campus with |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Inner Loop and the central city | ||||
| Houston ISD | 101912 | B (85) | 45% | HISD Demographics and Zoning |
| Memorial and West (Spring Branch, Memorial, the Energy Corridor, the far-west corridor) | ||||
| Katy ISD | 101914 | B (88) | 7% | Katy ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| Spring Branch ISD | 101920 | B (85) | 5% | Spring Branch ISD boundary lookup |
| Northwest edges (beyond Oak Forest, Garden Oaks and Timbergrove, which are Houston ISD) | ||||
| Cypress-Fairbanks ISD | 101907 | B (86) | 4% | Cy-Fair ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| Klein ISD | 101915 | B (88) | 1% | Klein ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| Tomball ISD | 101921 | A (92) | under 1% | Tomball ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| Waller ISD | 237904 | B (80) | under 1% | Waller ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| North and Northeast (Northside, Greenspoint, the airport corridor, Kingwood and Lake Houston) | ||||
| Aldine ISD | 101902 | C (79) | 8% | Aldine ISD boundary lookup |
| Humble ISD | 101913 | B (83) | 7% | Humble ISD boundary lookup |
| Huffman ISD | 101925 | C (71) | 2% | Huffman ISD boundary lookup |
| Spring ISD | 101919 | C (76) | 1% | Spring ISD boundary lookup · my school pages |
| Sheldon ISD | 101924 | C (79) | under 1% | Sheldon ISD boundary lookup |
| Crosby ISD | 101906 | B (81) | under 1% | Crosby ISD boundary lookup |
| Conroe ISD | 170902 | B (85) | under 1% | Conroe ISD boundary lookup |
| New Caney ISD | 170908 | C (79) | under 1% | New Caney ISD boundary lookup |
| East and Southeast (the East End, the Ship Channel side, Clear Lake and the bay side) | ||||
| Pasadena ISD | 101917 | B (84) | 4% | Pasadena ISD boundary lookup |
| Clear Creek ISD | 084910 | B (89) | 4% | Clear Creek ISD boundary lookup |
| Galena Park ISD | 101910 | B (88) | 2% | Galena Park ISD boundary lookup |
| Deer Park ISD | 101908 | B (83) | 1% | Deer Park ISD boundary lookup |
| Goose Creek CISD | 101911 | B (80) | under 1% | Goose Creek CISD boundary lookup |
| Channelview ISD | 101905 | B (81) | under 1% | Channelview ISD boundary lookup |
| La Porte ISD | 101916 | B (86) | under 1% | La Porte ISD boundary lookup |
| Southwest (Alief, Sharpstown, the Fort Bend County section) | ||||
| Alief ISD | 101903 | C (78) | 5% | Alief ISD boundary lookup |
| Fort Bend ISD | 079907 | B (82) | 2% | Fort Bend ISD boundary lookup |
| Lamar CISD | 079901 | B (87) | under 1% | Lamar CISD boundary lookup |
Shares of the city’s land area measured on the U.S. Census Bureau’s TIGERweb unified school-district layer, October 19, 2026, rounded; the 25 districts add up to the whole city. Ratings are TEA 2026 district accountability ratings with the overall score in parentheses. Land area is not homes: much of the Katy ISD and Humble ISD share is freeway corridor, reservoir land and Lake Houston. Houston ISD, Aldine ISD, Alief ISD, Pasadena ISD and Sheldon ISD also serve parts of the city outside the group they are listed under; the group is where you are most likely to meet them.
Why the address decides, not the city
Four different boundaries get mixed together when someone says a house is in Houston, and none of them line up. The city limits are drawn by the City of Houston through more than a century of annexations. The ZIP code is drawn by the Postal Service for mail routes. The mailing city on an envelope is set by the post office that delivers it, which is why thousands of homes in unincorporated Harris County carry a Houston address and pay no City of Houston tax. The school district is a separate unit of government with its own board, its own tax rate and its own map. When the city annexed Kingwood in 1996, most of Kingwood stayed in Humble ISD. When the city reached out to the Energy Corridor and the Addicks reservoir land, that ground stayed in Katy ISD and Spring Branch ISD. The district lines were there first, and annexation did not redraw them.
That is also why a search for homes in Houston will show you houses inside Houston ISD and houses in two dozen other districts under the same city name. A few more wrinkles: Bellaire, West University Place, Southside Place, the six Memorial Villages and Jersey Village are separate cities inside or against the Houston footprint. Each has its own city taxes, and a house in one of them is not in the City of Houston even though the map makes it look surrounded. More on how to tell whether a Houston address is inside the city limits in a post coming soon. The last wrinkle is that districts re-zone. Fast-growing districts open campuses and redraw attendance boundaries every few years, so the campus a house was zoned to when the listing photos were taken may not be the campus it is zoned to the year you move in. The district is settled by the lot; the campus is settled by the district’s current boundary map, and you confirm both before you rely on either.
Which school districts serve which parts of Houston
My Houston city guide walks the city in seven areas, and the school districts in Houston, TX follow the same shape. Inside the Loop and across the central city, from the Heights and Montrose to the Museum District, Third Ward and the East End’s inner edge, Houston ISD is the district almost everywhere.
West of the Loop the picture changes quickly. Spring Branch ISD covers Spring Branch and much of Memorial, Houston ISD still holds pockets, Katy ISD takes over on the far west side past the Energy Corridor, and Alief ISD runs along the south of that corridor.
Northwest, the in-city neighborhoods of Oak Forest, Garden Oaks and Timbergrove are Houston ISD, with Cypress-Fairbanks, Aldine and Klein ISDs at the city’s edges. Many of the homes with a Houston 77095, 77084 or 77041 address sit outside the city limits and are zoned to Cy-Fair ISD; my Living in Cypress guide and my first-time buyer guide for Cypress cover that district in depth.
North and northeast, Aldine ISD serves the Northside and Greenspoint sections, Humble ISD serves Kingwood and the Lake Houston side, and Spring, Sheldon, Huffman and Crosby ISDs each take a piece, with Houston ISD still present near the core. The small Montgomery County portion of the city brings Conroe ISD and New Caney ISD into the count.
East and southeast, Houston ISD serves Fifth Ward, Denver Harbor and the East End, Galena Park and Pasadena ISDs pick up along the Ship Channel, Clear Creek ISD serves Clear Lake, and Sheldon ISD reaches the northeast edge. Deer Park, Channelview, La Porte and Goose Creek each touch the city along its eastern reach. Southwest, Alief ISD serves Alief and parts of Sharpstown, Houston ISD serves Meyerland, Westbury and Braeswood Place, and the city’s Fort Bend County section brings in Fort Bend ISD and a sliver of Lamar CISD. South, around Sunnyside, South Park and the Hobby area, it is Houston ISD with Pasadena ISD at the edges. For Katy ISD on the west side, my Living in Katy guide has the district detail.
What school district is Houston, TX in? Start with Houston ISD
When the question is asked that way, the answer is 25 districts, and the biggest of them is Houston ISD at about 45% of the city’s land area. Houston ISD is rated B with an overall score of 85 in TEA’s 2026 accountability ratings, and it has been governed by a state-appointed Board of Managers since 2023. The district runs magnet and school-choice programs that are open by application, so a Houston ISD address gives a family its zoned campus plus the option to apply elsewhere in the district. The current application window and the program list are on HISD’s school choice site. For the zoned campus itself, the district’s Demographics and Zoning page carries the attendance-boundary lookup, and that lookup is the answer I rely on.
How to check a Houston house’s school district before you offer
Sorting out the school districts in Houston, TX for one specific house takes about ten minutes, and I run this check on every house my clients ask about before we go see it. The order matters, because each step confirms the one before it.
- Start with the appraisal-district record. Look the address up on HCAD for Harris County, FBCAD for Fort Bend County or MCAD for Montgomery County. The jurisdiction list on that record names every unit that taxes the property, and the school district is one of them. On HCAD the list sits under the Jurisdictions heading on the property page, and the district appears there by name. If the list says Houston ISD, the house is in Houston ISD; if it says Katy ISD, it is in Katy ISD, whatever the mailing address says. The same list tells you whether the City of Houston itself is a taxing unit, which settles the city-limits question too.
- Then confirm the campus with the district’s own boundary tool. Each district publishes an attendance-boundary lookup; for Houston ISD it lives on the Demographics and Zoning page linked above. Type the address, read the elementary, middle and high school it returns, and note the school year the map is for. A boundary tool beats a listing’s school field, which is typed in by whoever entered the listing and is not verified by the district.
- Read the TEA report card. On TXschools.gov, search the district by name or TEA ID and the campus by name, and read the 2026 rating with its score. It is public and dated, and it is the only rating I quote.
- Check whether the boundary is about to move. Growing districts post rezoning proposals on their board agendas well before they take effect. If a district has a boundary study underway, ask what it means for the address before you get attached to the house.
- Ask me. I run this check for my clients, and I keep campus facts for the Cy-Fair, Katy, Klein, Spring, Tomball and Waller ISD schools they ask about most on my school pages, from Bridgeland High School and Cy-Fair High School to Cinco Ranch High School.
What the district changes beyond the classroom
The school district you are zoned to is also the ISD line on your property tax bill, usually the largest single line on it, and it changes from district to district even for two houses with the same Houston address; my post on how Texas property taxes land in a monthly mortgage payment walks through how that line is built.
Transfer and choice options differ by district, and each district sets its own rules. Within-district choice means applying to a magnet, specialty or non-zoned campus inside the district you already live in, which Houston ISD and several others offer by application. An inter-district transfer means asking a different district to accept your child, which some districts allow on a space-available basis, sometimes with tuition, and some do not. Neither is something I can promise on a buyer’s behalf, so if a transfer is part of your plan, get the district’s current policy in writing before you commit to the address.
Resale is easy to overlook while you are still shopping. Houston home buyers search by district, so the district a house is zoned to shapes how many buyers shop it when you sell. In appraisal terms, the pool of buyers a house will compete for when you sell is set the day you buy it, so it belongs on your list before you buy.
How I help families with this
Questions about school districts in Houston, TX come up on nearly every purchase I work, and the way I handle them is the same each time. Before we tour, I run the appraisal-district record and the district boundary lookup on every address on the list, so the district and the zoned campuses are on paper before anyone falls for a house. When a family is choosing between areas, we open the district’s boundary map together and look at where the lines run relative to the houses they like, because a boundary a block away is the kind of detail that changes a decision. And I describe districts by what TEA and the boundary map say, nothing more; which district is right for your family is your call, and my job is to make sure you are making it with the facts straight.
If you are interviewing real estate agents for a Houston purchase, a few questions tell you quickly whether they do this work: ask how they confirm which district a house is in, and the answer should be the appraisal-district record. Ask how they confirm the zoned campus, and the answer should be the district’s boundary tool, with the school year named. Ask what happens if a district is rezoning. A real estate agent who can answer all three has done this before. My guide on how to choose a Realtor in Houston has the rest of the interview, and my buyer representation page explains how I work with buyers under a written agreement, with compensation set out in writing before showings begin.
Houston school districts, questions answered
What school district is Houston, TX in?
Houston is not in one school district. Twenty-five independent school districts serve homes inside the City of Houston, and Houston ISD is the largest at about 45% of the city’s land area. The address of the specific property decides which district applies, and the school district listed on the property’s appraisal-district record is the one that counts.
How many school districts are in the City of Houston?
Twenty-five school districts in Houston, TX touch the city limits, measured on the U.S. Census Bureau’s school-district layer in October 2026. After Houston ISD, the largest shares of the city’s land area belong to Aldine, Katy, Humble, Spring Branch, Alief, Pasadena, Cypress-Fairbanks and Clear Creek ISDs; the rest are smaller pieces at the city’s edges, some under 1% of the city each.
Is every Houston address in Houston ISD?
No. Houston ISD covers about 45% of the city’s land area, so a little more than half of the city sits in other districts, and a Houston mailing address outside the city limits is very often in a different district as well. Only the appraisal-district record settles it for a particular house.
How do I find out what school district a Houston house is in?
Look the address up on the county appraisal district site, HCAD for Harris County, FBCAD for Fort Bend County or MCAD for Montgomery County, and read the jurisdiction list on the record; the school district is one of the taxing units named there. Then confirm the zoned campuses with that district’s own attendance-boundary lookup and note the school year it covers.
Can a Houston address be in Katy ISD or Cy-Fair ISD?
Yes. Katy ISD covers about 7% of the city’s land area on the far west side past the Energy Corridor, and Cypress-Fairbanks ISD covers about 4% at the northwest edge. Many of the homes with a Houston 77095, 77084 or 77041 mailing address sit outside the city limits, are zoned to Cy-Fair ISD, and are not in the City of Houston at all.
What are the TEA 2026 ratings for the school districts in Houston, TX?
The Texas Education Agency released its 2026 accountability ratings on August 14, 2026. The 25 districts that touch the City of Houston carry ratings of A, B or C; Houston ISD, the largest, is rated B with a score of 85, and the table above lists every district’s rating and overall score. A district rating covers the whole district; each campus carries its own rating on TXschools.gov.
Do school districts change their boundaries?
Yes. District lines between ISDs rarely move, but attendance boundaries inside a district change whenever the district opens a campus or rebalances enrollment, which fast-growing districts do every few years. Confirm the zoned campus for the school year you are buying into, and ask the district whether a boundary study is underway.
Buying in Houston and haven’t hired a real estate agent yet?
Talk with me before you sign a buyer representation agreement with anyone. I run the appraisal-district record and the district boundary lookup on every address before we tour, and when a line runs close to a house you like we read the zoning map together. That is how I work every purchase, anywhere in the Greater Houston area. No pressure and no obligation. If you are already working with another real estate agent, that agent is the right person to take this post to.
Schedule a Consultation Call or Text (281) 500-7077
Kevan Pewitt · REALTOR® & Broker · Houston Prime Realty
Last updated: October 2026 · District count and land-area shares from the U.S. Census Bureau TIGERweb unified school-district and incorporated-place layers, measured October 19, 2026; district ratings from the Texas Education Agency 2026 accountability ratings (released August 14, 2026) via TXschools.gov (data last updated October 5, 2026); Houston ISD zoning from the district’s Demographics and Zoning page; parcel jurisdictions from HCAD, FBCAD and MCAD. Refreshed each August when TEA releases new ratings. General information, not legal, tax or educational advice; confirm any district or campus with the district itself before relying on it.
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